


Agarwaen

by fisheyed



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, Podfic Available
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 05:15:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17135660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fisheyed/pseuds/fisheyed
Summary: I love you. I love you. I love you.Túrin wants to say,I love you, too.He never does.In which Túrin contemplates sacrifice and loss and love.





	Agarwaen

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Azaisya](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azaisya/gifts).



> This fic was written for the [@officialtolkiensecretsanta](https://officialtolkiensecretsanta.tumblr.com/) event for 2018! My giftee is [@azaisya](https://azaisya.tumblr.com/) \- I really hope you'll like this! I'm afraid it's not as Hurt/Comfort as I was planning, but, uhhhhh there's Hurt for sure haha
> 
> ALSO shoutout to [aschuylersister](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aschuylersister/pseuds/aschuylersister) for being an amazing last-minute beta even though you've never read the Silm!!! I really appreciate it! :)

****1.

Morwen holds her children close, Lalaith pressed to her chest and Túrin beneath her arm. Their father is not here.

The room is cold, even with three layers of blankets and furs. There is no fire burning in their home tonight. The Enemy is too close to risk such a luxury.

She holds them close and tells them a story about war, sacrifice, and tragedy, her voice soft and rough with fatigue.

 

* * *

 

2.

The Elves do not have tales of sacrifice.

Túrin thinks it strange when he's younger, when he asks for the story of Balan the Lamb and Melian shifts her never-blinking gaze to him, hair glittering with jewels his mother could never dream of, and says,

“Who?”

 

* * *

 

3.

The forest of Doriath is cold. Not just in the winter, but in the summer and spring and fall. It seems like the underbrush is always layered in frost or leftover snow.

Sometimes it rains, as it does now. Túrin puts out buckets to catch the rainwater; Beleg will carry them inside to boil away the grime later. Today, he places five around their house, hoping that will be sufficient, and steps back inside.

The house was built for one. Beleg built it himself, probably decades ago, and Túrin still finds it fascinating that it remains standing. Houses that Men build aren't made for long periods of time. No one ever lives that long, especially in wartime.

“You’re back!”

It's Beleg. He's whittling something in wood with one of his fine Elven knives, but his hands pause in their work when he looks up at Túrin with a wide smile and warm eyes.

It has been like this for some time now. Túrin will be as he always is and Beleg will smile, will laugh, will sing, will cook… will share a bed, will touch his hand, will watch him when he thinks Túrin doesn't notice.

Túrin is of age now and understands what this means. His gaze lingers on his friend as well, on his long, pale hair that Túrin knows is as soft as it looks. On the way his eyes crinkle when he laughs at the terrible jokes Túrin tells. On the way he draws his bow, the cool gaze he adopts to watch his prey, the raw strength that hides beneath the thin Elven cloth he wears.

It scares Túrin. He thinks of how he's never liked anyone quite as much as he's liked Beleg; he thinks of the distant love he'd once held for a mother and sister he can't quite seem to remember; he thinks of the way his palms sweat when Beleg compliments him and the way his spine seems to shiver when he rests a callused hand on his shoulder.

Túrin is scared because he has never imagined being so happy in his entire life.

He doesn't remember his mother well, but he remembers her stories about the Eastern land over the mountains. Her tales were sad and dark and short, the opposite of the colorful, poetic Elven stories Beleg had taught him once. But then, the Elves came from Valinor. They do not understand the terrors Men suffered.

Men understand the Enemy. Men know what it is to sacrifice.

Túrin has been quiet for too long. Beleg is watching him with a faded smile and worried eyes.

Túrin wonders what will be slaughtered to maintain this happiness.

 

* * *

 

4.

The body is crushed at the bottom of the cliff, head twisted at an impossible angle.

The gods never ask for easy sacrifices.

 

* * *

 

5.

“Idiot,” Beleg says, arms weak as he clings to Túrin. Elves are more resilient than Men, but even an Elf will deteriorate after three days without food.

“I know.”

“Both of us,” Beleg pants, eyes squeezed shut.

“You've done nothing wrong.”

“Shouldn't have appeared so suddenly… Your people have the right to be suspicious. They do not like Elves.”

“They've never met one before. They don't understand.”

“You did not tell them of me?”

“It never came up.”

Beleg shifts uncomfortably at that. Túrin pushes open his tent and lays him on his pallet, wrapping him in furs and brushing his hair away from his forehead.

“You've… found someone else?”

Túrin frowns. “You're starved and dehydrated and that's what you're worried about?”

“You left,” Beleg says, “and you didn't even stop to say goodbye.”

“I’d killed a man, Beleg. I couldn't.”

He murmurs, “I would've gone with you.”

“I know,” Túrin says. “That's why I left.”

 

* * *

 

6.

Beleg leaves in the winter and returns in the spring. He carries a sword with him now. It is beautiful and expertly crafted, and it hums with a strange power.

Túrin hates the relief he feels at Beleg's return. It is selfish.

Nothing good could ever come of love.

Morwen had loved Húrin, and now he is lost. Túrin had loved Lalaith, and now she lays rotting in the earth.

Happiness is a luxury. Something will come along to steal it away, and watching Beleg now, laughing and drinking with his previous torturers around a glowing fire, Túrin cannot help but begin to count the days.

 

* * *

 

7.

“I love you,” Beleg whispers into the shell of his ear, running his thumb gently across Túrin's fingers.

Túrin swallows the lump in his throat. “You shouldn't.”

“Lúthien did,” Beleg reminds him, watching him in earnest. “Are you saying she was wrong to love a Man?”

“That’s not what I meant,” Túrin begins, heart aching —

“What, because you've killed? I am Beleg Cúthalion, Chief Marchwarden of Doriath, a warrior so feared that orcs shudder at my name. Túrin,” he says, “I am far older and have taken far more lives than you have. I am not afraid.”

“Nothing good can come of loving me,” Túrin says.

Beleg studies his face. “I do not think so.”

“There will be a sacrifice,” he whispers, grasping Beleg's hand.

“I am willing to make it,” Beleg says without hesitation.

He doesn't understand.

It is Túrin's sacrifice to make. The House of Hador is cursed; the world takes and it takes and it takes.

 

* * *

 

8.

_I love you. I love you. I love you._

Túrin wants to say, _I love you, too._

He never does.

 

* * *

 

9.

_I want to die._

The orcs rushed up the mountain, faster and fiercer and in far greater numbers than Túrin and his Men had ever seen before. Their eyes glowed with bloodlust and their teeth were bared, dripping tusks open in throaty roars. Túrin remembers that the first to go was Ulrad, who slashed at an orc’s throat even as its axe sliced open his stomach.

All around him, Men died. All of his friends, his brothers, the bravest and most loyal warriors Túrin knows he’d ever meet.

 _Sacrifice_ , his mother whispers in front of an unlit fire. _Like lambs at the slaughter._

He is chained to a tree and the damned murderers are laughing and spitting at his feet and Túrin is bleeding out slowly and he knows this:

_I am going to die._

 

* * *

 

1.5.

_We are all called to sacrifice._

_There was once a Man named Balan, who led his people through the mountains, over dark and violent lands, hiding in shadows until the Great Eye’s gaze slid past._

_He loved his people and his people loved him. He comforted them with stories and songs of the Great Gods, the ones who created the stars and ruled the skies above and the oceans deep. Balan was so firm in his belief that all those who followed him could not help but hope as he did._

_This is how, when the Golden One came to his frightened people, striking Balan’s instrument and chanting in strange tongues, Balan knew what he needed to do._

_Balan left his people willingly to appease the Golden One. He swore to the strange being his freedom, his life, his name, and his love. He left his sons behind and only asked them to watch over the people to whom his heart had belonged for so long._

_Life forces us to make difficult choices, my children. Balan forfeited his to save his people. Someday, you may be called upon to make a similar choice._

 

* * *

 

10.

Túrin stares down at the bloody body in his arms and realizes that he has never known sacrifice in his life.

Saeros was not a sacrifice. Saeros was a mistake and a cruelty that Túrin took too far. He died for nothing.

Túrin’s band of outlaws were not sacrifices, either. They fought bravely and they were cut down as warriors, not as helpless sheep. They knew the risks they were taking. They died, and they did not die for nothing, but they did not die for Túrin.

The broken Elf in his arms was an accident. A flash in the dark, a rush of painful memories. He could not have known. No one could have known.

Túrin’s arms shake as he lays the Elf carefully on the shroud the Nargothrond sentinels have provided. The court watches on in quiet, their shock and grief mingling until one is almost indifferentiable from the other.

“I am Agarwaen,” he says, and the Elves murmur, _Bloodstained_ , “son of Úmarth,” _Ill-fate_ , “and I have come seeking sanctuary in your lands.”

“You bring a dead Elf to our lands and expect a warm welcome?” the king says from atop his finely carved throne, circlet gleaming in the torchlight. “You are strangers to us, the Man especially.”

Túrin starts, “Please, we beg —”

“I am Beleg Cúthalion,” his companion interrupts, voice steady, “the Strongbow, and Chief Marchwarden of Doriath. The Man who stands by me now is Túrin, the Dragon-helm.”

Beleg puts a hand on his shoulder and Túrin can feel his fingers trembling. “The one who lays here at your feet is Gwindor, one of your Elf lords. His death was an accident, but he died with honor and bravery after having suffered decades deep in the mines of Angband. We demand a proper funeral for him, and that is all. Should you choose not to shelter us, we will move on.”

 _Unlikely_ , Túrin despairs. The hidden kingdom Balan had once been trapped within is surrounded by prowling bands of orcs and other fell creatures. They would never make it.

One heartbeat, two.

The king says slowly, “I know your names. Your reputation precedes you, Cúthalion. And you, Dragon-helm.”

The golden-haired Elf at the king’s side bursts into a sob, unable to contain herself any further, barely able to glance at Gwindor’s bloody body before she throws open the throne room doors and is gone.

Túrin looks down at the sword in his hands. It is heavy with the blood of an innocent and a band of filthy orcs.

“Then you know what I can do for you,” Túrin says.

The king’s eyes light up in interest.

“I will give you my freedom and my life,” Túrin says, “and anything else you might ask of me. I give this to you willingly. Just,” and he can’t bear to look at Beleg, doesn’t want to see the disappointment in his eyes, “let Cúthalion return to Doriath. His services are more urgently needed there. I will serve you well, I swear. I have seen much of war in the years you have spent hidden. I —”

“I understand,” the king says. “But I would have Cúthalion speak.”

Túrin has lost.

 

* * *

 

11.

This is a sacrifice:

An Elf who has been tortured for decades, who cannot remember the brightness of the moon (much less lightning), who has not tasted a warm meal nor held a loved one nor laughed or smiled in recent memory, throws himself on a sword for someone he just met.

Sacrifice is not loss. Túrin has lost and lost and lost but never before did he willingly surrender something dear to him. He had not known loss the way Balan did, trapped within the very walls that hold Túrin now.

“I love you,” Beleg says.

Túrin thinks of his sword now pledged to King Orodreth of Nargothrond, of the invisible chain that binds him here. He wants desperately to leave. He knows how this place choked Balan, closed in on him. He knows that seeing the sun and moon will become rare occurrences, more of a luxury than a universal truth.

He wishes Beleg weren’t here. One Elf, he’s certain, could escape a band of orcs. Beleg is certainly strong and swift enough. Túrin would only slow him down. But Beleg knows how much this place scares him, how much he detests being the only Man among Elves…

“I love you, too,” Túrin says.

And they lay on the bed together and clasp hands and pretend that they are back home, in their house in the woods. Túrin pretends he can smell the rain falling down around them.

 

* * *

 

12.

This is a sacrifice:

A Man pledges his life to a strange king he does not know, hoping that his thralldom will set his lover free. But his lover will not leave him to waste away in the dark.

An Elf leaves the comfort of the stars above to keep his lover warm and safe and loved. He knows that his lover will die in the blink of an eye, that he is temporary and inconstant and vaporous, but he is willing to stay with him until he leaves or fades, whichever comes first.

He watches his lover and he knows he cannot leave.

**Author's Note:**

> *Balan is Bëor's Mannish name. Bëor is the Elvish name he gets in Nargothrond, and it means "vassal" according to tolkiengateway lol
> 
> (also sorry i love finrod/bëor but i do think the early Man-Elf relations were weird ngl)
> 
> Anyway, thanks for reading! Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! @azaisya, I hope you have a FANTASTIC day!! :) Thanks for a cool AF prompt!
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr](http://bisexualturin.tumblr.com/post/181373419598/agarwaen-ao3)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Agarwaen](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17358041) by [WolffyLuna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WolffyLuna/pseuds/WolffyLuna)




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